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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25441183">Am I alive or am I just dreaming? (i'm sure they're the same thing)</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/LegionOfPeace/pseuds/LegionOfPeace'>LegionOfPeace</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Creepy, Fist Fights, Fluff, Gen, Monsters, Temporary Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-07-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 07:35:17</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Not Rated</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,980</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25441183</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/LegionOfPeace/pseuds/LegionOfPeace</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>These are random little snippets of a larger story I might write one day, not chronological or coherent in anyway but what can you do. This is about the dream pack, mostly proko and kavinsky dealing with the aftermath of bringing proko back from the dead/a dream. Also Adam isn't really friends with the Gangsey anymore because I love him on his own.<br/>This is my first (published) fanfic so pls be nice :)</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>3</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Am I alive or am I just dreaming? (i'm sure they're the same thing)</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>It was summer, and he was dying. To be completely fair, he died every summer, molting out of his sweat-slick skin and his lovesick life to become whomever he wanted to be. Who he wanted to be was Kavinsky. Kavinsky who bought expensive cars just to crash them, who had expensive friends just to kill them.</p>
<p>---</p>
<p>Proko felt was wrong, different, grotesque even. Like Frankenstein's monster, he has been torn apart and put back together again. Unlike Frankenstein's monster, he looked like he had. No hair out of place, no scars marring his perfect skin. If anything, he looked more lively than he had in, his cheeks rosy and wind chafed, eyes sparkling with an unsaid joke.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>---</p>
<p>Depending on who told youthis tale, it was about Prokopenko. At the same time, it was never about Prokopenko, he would always be the side character or the antagonist. He thinks that it was because of this that he was always hungry, hungry somewhere that food would never reach. He felt like half a soul, like some shell of a person, with no concept of deep emotions. He liked to think sometimes he was a ghost, with his white hair and pale skin it wasn't that hard.<br/>(No matter where you started in this story it was about Kavinsky. If Proko was nothing, then Kavinsky was everything. He felt more alive than anyone that proko has ever met.)</p>
<p>---</p>
<p>he wakes up covered in little white hemlock flowers, and blood. prokopenko is kneeling over him eyes wide and wondrous. They're in a clearing next to the silent motorway, it's past midnight and they have school tomorrow, but this is more important.<br/>“where do you go when you do that?<br/>proko demanded, looking hungry.<br/>kavinsky looked at him, greasy and still in his rumpled school uniform. beautiful, and empty, and so goddamn loyal, like a puppy begging to be kicked. but k didn’t have the heart to kick puppies, not really. any hard act he puts on is immediately gone when proko smiles at him all innocent-like. I’m a fucking coward. he thinks.<br/>“yeah, darlin’ it’s heaven. you want anything next time I’m there? cuz creating new pills to push is getting kinda old.”<br/>“what about the monsters?”<br/>first of all, how the fuck did proko know about the monsters, that perceptive motherfucker. And second, he would never bring out any monsters, not while there was a chance proko would be there (no matter that there was no monster out there could even rival kavinsky when he’s all fired up, and proko was an expert at dealing with k.)<br/>“nevermind the monsters darlin' I'm an expert at making these kinds of things go my way. And besides, I don't think the dead mind that much when I send them another one.”<br/>He smirks but Proko frowns and pushes himself up off the wet grass patch that k had taken up residence on. He picks up his bag and angrily stalks off towards the parked corvette. (it was hot pink with sparkly fenders. It took seven weeks of planning and meditating and one really pissed off car dealer for Kavinsky to make this one.)<br/>“I mind.”<br/>fuck he was such an asshole, why couldn’t he just keep his goddamned mouth shut for once?<br/>kavinsky scrambled to his feet and ran over to where proko was standing. He was hungover and still riding the high of some magical shit, but he really didn't care at this point. Making Proko sad kinda ruined his high anyways.<br/>“you’re not dead. so stop thinking about it. I didn’t even really do anything besides bring your soul back.”<br/>“yeah, back from the dead.”<br/>Proko wasn’t letting this go. He remembered that place, the forest that stretched through the years. like a half-forgotten dream or a sepia photograph, all of his memories of that place turned its horrible twisted nature into something beautiful. He was dead, wasn’t he? that’s what happens when you see the silver city and realise that the only city that mother nature will give her children is one where the trees grow taller than the sky. where the brush is so dense and so dark it blocks out the nonexistent sun and the branches move to grab you and tear you apart-<br/>“proko hey,”<br/>Kavinsky grabbed his arm tightly and pulled him out of his trance. He was sitting in the passenger seat of the corvette, already speeding down the freeway, he must have spaced out for a minute (or an hour, who really knows anymore). He stares at his hands is a detached sort of wonder. his palms were red and had angry little half-moon marks on them. When did he start clenching his hands?<br/>“you're not dead okay?" kavinsky says after seeing that proko's come back to himself.<br/>"you died yes, but like... only for a day or two, and then I remade you. I gave you a whole new body that’s 100% alive with zero bullet wounds in it.”<br/>It kinda hurt proko's feelings that Kavinsky spent more time making his fucking corvette than he did making his best friend.</p>
<p>---</p>
<p>proko stared at him. kavinsky stared back. they were sitting in his dingy basement at 3am. kavinsky sat with his back against the cool cement wall, and prokopenko mirroring him across from him. k slowly tilted his head to one side, prokopenko did the same, head twisting with a sickening crack.<br/>“so.... is he alive?”<br/>fucking Jiang, asking stupid questions at stupid times. k rolled his eyes, proko copied the movement, eyes never blinking or straying from k’s face.<br/>“I don’t know, maybe? Proko if you’re in there blink once.”<br/>Proko did a slow exaggerated blink, and his mouth twitched trying to hide a smirk.<br/>“proko, blink twice if there’s something in there with you.”<br/>“dude!”<br/>k cried with outrage, tearing his eyes away from proko to look at Jiang who was playing Mario Kart and trying to smoke a joint at the same time (unsuccessfully, he was in the last place).<br/>“that’s a fucking sick thing to ask somebody.”<br/>Jiang shrugged and took a hit, he then turned around and blew smoke rings at prokopenko's head.<br/>“None of y’all were gonna say anything, and I had to be sure this wasn’t going to turn into some kinda weird horror movie. I'm a girl, I’d die first!”<br/>kavinsky stood up and plucked the joint out of Jiang's hand. He blew it straight in Proko's face. He blinked with surprise and cracked a smile.<br/>“Proko! Glad you're back with us, tell the man how rude he was to ask that of you!” He was elated that his friend was human and not just another fucking puppet. Prokopenko turned around to look at Jiang and spoke the first word of his new existence.<br/>“your kind of a dick, dude. Also, it would be hella creepy if I were possessed, and if I was I would totally kill you first, serves you right for blowing your rank ass weed on me.” (nobody mentioned that kavinsky also blew smoke at him, kavinsky was exempt from most rules.)</p>
<p>---</p>
<p>You look at him and all you can see is stardust. All the little supernovas that came together to make him what he is, one beautiful guy. You start to wonder if this is how the real proko felt, and you feel bad. You can feel him sometimes, in the space right next to your heart, right below your ribs. you wonder if that’s where the soul is supposed to be. You wonder if you still have a soul. And if you do, do you have his? or do you have your own; jumbled together from kavinsky‘s magic mind palace from who he thought you were. The other (scarier) option is that you have nothing, no soul. You're getting really good at not thinking about that option. (Except late at night or early in the morning when everyone else is asleep and you're annoyingly awake. Because that option means that when you die you won't go to heaven - or hell. You'll probably just cease to exist like a broken toy without batteries.) Sometimes you think of that myth, the one about Orpheus and Eurydice. When you were younger, you wondered what would happen if she had gone up to the living again and if she would be able to go back down again. They say you cannot enter the underworld twice. Of course, Orpheus had one chance to get his wife, and Kavinsky had thousands. Thousands of empty soulless bodies piled up somewhere; all you (at least another version of you). Is there one that’s missing the mole you have on your eyelid? Did kavinsky kill him because of that imperfection? Will he kill you too? (you're really bad at not thinking about something).</p>
<p>---</p>
<p>Everyone knew the dream pack. sharp wit with even sharper teeth to back them up, they were legendary. covered in ink and piercings the way no 17-year-old had the right to be. and even if you didn’t know the dream pack, you knew kavinsky. leader of the hounds, the alpha dog amongst alpha dogs, and an all-around shady dude. Which is why Adam gave them a wide berth, and kavinsky and even wider one at that. their hunger made him uncomfortable, the restless gleam in their eyes wanting bloodshed and excitement and more. they were rabid dogs, or black holes, just eating and wanting until there’s nothing left of themselves. Adam knew that look knew it like the back of his hand or the scar or his right forearm. he saw that look every day in the mirror, and he knew that one day he would look and find that he didn’t recognise himself anymore.<br/>today was not that day. today was the day that Adam would sit the last of his finals, go to work, and then finish off the school year with a night of uninterrupted sleep.<br/>the pack obviously didn’t understand this, or they understood it and just didn’t care. they were currently throwing peanuts into each other’s mouths with increasing enthusiasm, and whooping when one was caught. Adam was staring at them, the whole library was staring at them. Why couldn’t they just be quiet and let me have one last study period before exams please. he sighed and looked back at his textbook and notes that are strewn about. there was no way he was getting any more work done with this racket. I’ll be fine. he thought. what more can I learn about ancient Greece in the next 15 minutes anyway?<br/>prokopenko noticed Adam Parrish. not intentionally, he didn’t stalk him or anything. He just noticed him, the same way he noticed the bird songs, or the frost on the field, with a passive curiosity that came with understanding the why and the how. Adam Parrish was Adam Parrish because of Richard Gansey and Ronan lynch, and that is how it will always be. Gansey, Ronan, Adam. Gansey and Ronan, then Adam. he didn’t try to understand their relationship, but he knew it was one of anger and bitterness and regret. long drawn out apologies and acrid silences. so when it exploded with Adam and Ronan having a full-on brawl in the courtyard, with Gansey on the sidelines torn between wanting to intervene and wanting Ronan to Win, prokopenko saw Adam Parrish and Adam Parrish saw nothing but red when he threw his fist into Ronan's face.<br/>Adam lost. mostly because he had more experience taking a beating than giving one, but also because he loved the look on Ronan's face when he was fighting. angry and restless and so alive. He doesn’t love it anymore, not when his bruises haven’t faded and he spends his free period in the library studying for a test he could do with his eyes closed.</p>
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